Let Me Creep Up On You || Ft. Creepy Things In Books I Love VS Hate!

I kept staring at the title of my post thinking, “Is that too creepy???” But eh I’m going with it.

Gets us all ready for today’s glorious LIST of creeptastic things. I assume this is in the spirit of Halloween which I would like to mention I don’t celebrate. Now that fact might be slightly odd considering I do like paranormal things and woods that eat people and shadows that slither out at night and grab your ankles. BUT! I am Australian. Halloween is a very Northern Hemisphere thing. Like it’s not even autumn for us. How can you celebrate harvest when we are gearing up for allergies and spring?!?

IT IS NONSENSE.

However. I still want to be creepy write a creepy post. So here I am. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I thought I’d creepily throw at you:

CREEPY THINGS I LOVE TO READ VS ONES I HATE

I mean you can “love” some creepy stuff, right??? That’s not weird??? It’s not like I have skeletons in my closet or am a part-time necromancer. (I’m a full time necromancer thank you very much.) Everything is fine, nothing to see here.

I also feel like it’s worth noting I don’t really read horror! I have watched Supernatural though and when I started some episodes really terrified me. Then I got old and “eh” about the horror parts. But I really haven’t read any traditional horror! Unless Coraline counts?!

1. SINISTER FAERIES CREEPING OUT OF THE WOODWORK

Let’s take a moment to doubly confirm: FAERIES ARE SUPER CREEPY. They’re so ethereal and deadly gorgeous and enjoy playing with people and then ripping them up, either emotionally or physically. Like, options here! If a book does faeries right, then they should be equal parts disturbing and entrancing. I AM ENTRANCED. I LOVE IT. Bring me the immortal creepy gorgeous queens and hobgoblins and kings of the dead. Briiiiing it.

2. SUPER CREEPY CHILDREN

Ok but kids in general are creepy. Sometimes they just stare at you or you give them scissors and glitter to do craft and think: “Yes, this is how I die.”

But I do have a total softness for the super creepy kids who turn up in books.Minya from Strange the Dreamer is a recent favourite since she’s stuck-as-a-child and catches ghosts souls and wILL MURDER YOU AAAAALL for wronging her. But yes, I will read about the disturbing children you are dead or eat your face or stare at you with big round eyes and start singing a freaky song.

3. CREEPY DARK FORESTS

YESSSS I LOVE THESE!! There is nothing quite like “THOSE” woods where people go in and don’t come out. And things claw out of the earth. And the witches make snacks. This is 10000% of the reason I will never leave the house also. So thanks, forests! You can keep the fresh air! I will keep alive, inside!

4. GHOSTS!

Aww bUT THEY’RE KIND OF CUTE!! I’ll just throw myself into the arms of Timekeeper and my ghosts in the clocktowers and also at The Raven Cyclewith the softest ghosts who, yes, do the most creepy things on occasion. But who are ultimately soft. I love ghosts. I maintain there aren’t enough ghost stories?! I WANT MORE SOFT SWEET GHOSTS. (This sounds like an ice cream order, but fine.)

5. ALL-POWERFUL DARK FORCE OUT TO GETCHA

Especially the ones that don’t have bodies yet, because: that stuff is CREEPY AS HECK. I’m particularly thinking of Osaron in A Conjuring Of Light and his whole “I NEED A BODY AND THEN I’M MAKING THE WORLD RIP ITSELF APART.” Steady on there, mate. I need popcorn before you begin.

No but really, I also find this terrifying…like you can’t look away from it?! They seem so all-powerful and impossible defeat it’s terrifying.

1. APOCALYPTIC DISEASES AND SICKNESS

I CAN’T DO IT. PLEASE TAKE IT AWAY. This just lights up my anxiety like the kind of Christmas Tree that explodes in your face. I watched this movie about the world dying from a fast-spreading disease and I DIDN’T SLEEP AGAIN. Ever. Ughgghghg. I can’t do it. It’s so out of control. (And cOULD HAPPEN?????)

2. HUGE AGE-GAPS IN RELATIONSHIPS

Well isn’t this one not like the others.

But seriously, this is creepy. Don’t pretend it’s not. Especially if they’re teens. There’s not a huge developmental or life difference between being 30 and 35. But there IS between being 15 and 20 (not to mention illegal?!?!?) so please take these books away from me where one part is 10000 years old and the other is sixteen.

I also watched Call Me By Your Name and am still asking how that is not predatory. RIGHTO.

3. SOMETHING IS IN THE WALLS / UNDER THE BED

jUST pLeASe DON’T. Omg. This freaks me out. I am definitely the person who doesn’t hang their limb over the edge of the bed!! Forget that my bed is on the floor. Evil doesn’t have to have dimension ok, it can still get me.

And things in the walls??? I don’t like it. I want out. Do not rattle things around in the basement or attic or walls or floorboards unless you want me screaming for 24 hours at the book.

4. ASYLUMS

This is also because I loathe even the IDEA of asylums and how despicable all the 1800s ones were. Also because it’s ridiculous. Any book that features an asylum IS GOING TO BE HAUNTED. And yet we have a gaggle of people going, “Yeah! Let’s put a school in an old asylum!”

I get it. You want the kids to get eaten. Stop acting surprised when everyone’s clawing out their eyes.

5. FALLING INTO GOOP

I JUST…NOT WITH THE TOUCHING THINGS. Like when they stick their hand in the residue of the monster?! Or start sinking in like this gross globby mire that sucks them down??? I throw up. (It’s worth noting I am very sensory sensitive so anything sensory offence is going to crawl up my skin and kILL ME if I’m reading.)

Just get it offfffff.

okay give me your list! some creepy things you LIKE to be freaked out by and ones you genuinely avoid because noooooope. do you agree with any of mine? (and link me to your TTTs if you want!)

Comments

I love this haha, although I have to disagree with creepy children – they’re a nope from me. Nope. I am also a person that sleeps all on the bed, cocooned in a quilt to keep the monster at bay.
Why hello, have you read the Lockwood & Co books? I think you’ll love them,. Much ghosts. Much danger. Kick ass protagonist.
Cora | http://www.teapartyprincess.co.uk/

Hahaha, great list! I know what you mean about things being under the bed and whatnot. One of my favourite things about Uprooted was the creepy forest, but at least the creepy forest was outside, I hate home invasion horror because I like feeling safe in my own bed, thanks very much. I tried taking a creepy quiz the other day and one of the questions was ‘How sure are you that you locked your door and that no one else is in your house?’ and I NOPED right out of there.

Love reading your posts as always 🙂 I haven’t read many books (if any!) that have fairies in them. But I love the fairy stories from folk tales where they’re evil things that you need to be careful of. I love folk tales. I don’t like the asylums or the creepy children either. I love horror though, I used to read and watch so much horror when I was younger and it’s been a while so getting back to it recently has been great! I’ve missed it. I’ve watched so much that it takes a lot to scare me now. I don’t like it in films or books when it’s about children getting hurt or animals, I just don’t agree with that. I stopped reading a novel once by Richard Laymon because a child was being abused :! oh no, I can’t read that. I actually find aliens scary because when I was a child I read too much about aliens and watched a film I was too young to watch.

Ah yes, creepy, he’s i read those books, I had an entire tbr for Halloween (lol guess who stuck to it) tbh i prefer thrilling, it’s much better than fear. Come to think about it I’m not even sure what creepy things I would like to read about???? What is wrong with me?????
I however do find Vicious to be a little creepy and I read that in late September and the Vampire Academy series has got some creepy vampires in it that I like and the only reason I’m not reading the second book right now is because my hold taking forever and I did consider reading Coraline but it was checked out so I have at least tried reading creepy things *high fives self*hands miss each other*

I like the title! I thought it was the title of a creepy, gory horror story!

I love your list of creepy thing you like! I’m into sinister faeries these days because of my WIP. BUT I’ll swap the virus outbreak with the kids. Even more if they are IN the walls! 😱 I still can’t get over the little girl in the wall in Supernatural. IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE SUPERNATURAL! LITTLE GIRLS IN WALLS ARE NOT MONSTERS! 😭

To the dislike list, I’ll also add killer clowns and people in plushies! I’m never going to Disney. 😶

“Supernatural” freaked me out when I first started (but I was also like . . . fourteen), and I was too stubborn to admit to my parents that they were kind of right and I was a little scared, so I kept pushing through. Now I’m totally fine with it and even laugh at the cheeseball horror effects sometimes. xD

As soon as a movie trailer starts in with the creepy kids singing some old nursery rhyme in a minor key, I’m out. There will never ever be anything more psychologically disturbing than tiny monstrous children.

GHOSTS, YES!!! And all the different forms ghosts can take!! I still remember reading your ghost story on Wattpad that I was absolutely obsessed with (but can’t remember the title for the life of me??? I know the protagonist was Moxie . . .).

I LOVE GHOSTS! This is very specific, but middle-grade/kid’s ghost-hunting books are some of my favorite books ever. I’m also now a fan of vampires, thanks to Anne Rice. And creepy forests have such a great aesthetic <3

I'm not a big fan of zombies or werewolves. They just seem too juvenile to me; I suppose I haven't yet seen them elevated to the sophisticated, mature level Anne Rice took vampires. But if I ever did, I might like them just as much.

I love creepy dark forests too! I actually spent a lot of my childhood in creepy forests, and I’d live in one if I could. I love all creepy things, but I’m not always the biggest fan of monsters, like vampires and stuff. Especially if there’s romance involved. Monster romance is not my thing.

The scenes in Gemina with the creepy parasite things made me squeamish. Did those freak you out??? I don’t think I’m quite as sensory sensitive as you but I was kind of hard core FREAKING while reading.
I am also grossed out by large age gaps in romance.

I agree with pretty much all of this. Fairies should be creepy and dangerous otherwise you’re doing it wrong!
And there is a very big difference between creepy & cool to read compared to creepy & omg I will never sleep with the light off again! Do not tell me there are thing in my walls. Nope. NOPE!! I AM NOT READING THAT!

YES TO CREEPY WOODS AND CHILDREN. Definitely hard same with the yucky age gap thing!! But I do have to say that I’m sometimes kinda a fan of the under the bed/in the walls thing?? Because it’s like genuinely SCARY to me and I like to bathe in my own fear. It just transportes me back to that childhood not-knowing-what-awaits-me-in-the-dark and that just really fascinates me! The concept of that manifestion of fear in regards to what we perceive as ordinary and I just?? Kinda dig it?

My list may also include those:

yay to creepy mythical creatures, bird like gestures and mannerisms and things/monsters/etc. that were already in the room with you but you only see them after the lights are on again and/or your eyes get accustumed to the dark.

nay to graphic descriptions of sickness, “flesh-eating” creatures and/or descriptions and references to ANYTHING LIKE THAT.
I’m also super iffy about the Bloody Mary and Ouija board thing BECAUSE I DONT EVEN WANT TO THINK ABOUT THOSE. They get to close for comfort – let’s just say it like that lol.

Hi, Cait!
Asfdyghjy i wrote a veeeeery similar post for my blog a couple of days ago, so i love seeing it up on your blog as well because, duhhhh, you already know yours is my fave, Cait. So glad to see all these Halloween-like clichés here, especially to know which ones you love and which ones you hate. WE AGREE ON SEVERAL <3
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THIS AMAZING POSSSTTTT <3
Kisses!

Y’know I haven’t really thought about this before somehow?? IDEFK how. I love this list, though. I broadly agree with the ‘I love!’ section for sure. I think my only real NOPEEEEE is animal torture/gratuitous animal death

My TTT is here!! It’s about ten book related anxieties, bc anxiety is the creepiest ok.

I get really creeped by eye trauma? Like, I have to look away if I see thorns on a screen because all I can feel is them going into my eyes. Not good, but also good, because if it creeps me out and that’s what someone was aiming to do, than they suceeded I guess?

And yes to proper creepy fae and fairies. Although I also love the pretty, shiny winged and flower dresses type of fairy, too. Maybe I can write a book including both sorts… hmm.

Asylums creep me out too! In books, they’re always run down and just straight up nasty. I would agree with the age gap, with the exception of immortals. ALSO YES, I am also a very sensory sense person (autism for the win, amirite?) so ANYTHING to do with touching I just hate.
Great Halloween post 🙂

I agree with so much of your list! I particularly love creepy fairies and forests and absolutely HATE huge age gaps in relationships. But I’m weirdly intrigued by books about deadly bacteria/viruses/parasites wiping out the human race? Possibly because I did a whole degree on infectious diseases and know just how realistic they can be. (Sometimes. Other times, the science behind those kinds of books is laughable.) They’re definitely terrifying though.

I totally agree about the asylum thing in books (mainly because it’s so cliche to me?), but I LOVE to look at pictures of abadoned asylums/houses/boats/etc. It’s creepy. I don’t sleep. I love it. It’s okay – I’m fine. I love the sinister fey, too! Although I DO like the apocalypse/disease stuff because it GENUINELY FREAKS ME OUT. My sister can’t do them – tbh,that’s mostly why I like them – but yeah. Freaky stuff.

But the one I agree with the MOST is the age gap. Like, ughughugh. That was why I hated Uprooted when I read it (though I want to give it another shot). It’s disgusting and awful. Nah, man. Can’t do it.

ILLUMINAE AND GEMINIA SCARED ME SO MUCH. I could not deal with that bloody zombie sickness, and I ligit suppressed screams every time Hanna crawled into the air vents, because HANNA THERE ARE EVIL SOUL SUCKING MONSTERS IN THERE GET OUT!!!! And when that one got into Ellie’s room I actually screamed and then got scolded for screaming in the house. I even felt bad for the bad guys who got caught by them. *shudders*
Most crazily, ~Olive

Big fat nope from me on the creepy children. They freak me out way too much, and kind of remind of dolls which I also hate (though weirdly enjoyed Frozen Charlotte, those dolls were creepy af but also kind of intriguing?). I love the ghosts/spirits in Timekeeper, I’m actually reading Firestarter at the moment and loving it! I do love the all powerful force and a good creepy forest as well. I like things that are eerie and atmospheric rather than outright terrifying. I also really hate massive age gaps between a MC and their love interest, why is pairing the sixteen year old with the hundreds of year old witch/vampire/faerie etc cool? It’s not, it’s predatory and sends seriously bad vibes out to teens reading those books.
I’m okay with most creepy things but one thing I cannot deal with is spiders. I am seriously arachnophobic and even in books….I just can’t. Big massive nope from me on the eight legged creepy crawlies!

YES YES YES. Okay so there’s a lot to address in this one but I won’t bore you with my babble-prone comments (mostly because I am lazy not, like, out of the goodness of my heart or whatever) so I’ll skip around to HUGE AGE-GAPS IN RELATIONSHIPS. Make it stop! I once wrote an essay for school on how disturbing age gaps are in certain forms of fiction (I cited a lot of teenage student and teacher relationships in popular culture but also other things too) and I remember how surprised I was when people didn’t react to it very well. I used Aria Montgomery and Ezra Fitz as an example, primarily using the PLL books because the show had only just started out at that point, and I swear to you–I thought my peers were going to RIOT. I was like, okay, fair, but IT’S STILL CREEPY. I mean, she’s like under-age and while the gap isn’t like decades long, it’s still a no. (And then the show adaptation was very keen on making it more creepy by changing him from not knowing she was underage at first, to actually knowing? And they were endgame? What?)

Wow I said I wouldn’t babble but I clearly lied. My point is: YES. I agree with you on the hates and the loves you listed. Super spot on it’s like you got inside my brain. What am I thinking about now?! Hahahaha

Hahahha love it! I actually really do enjoy most of the things on your hate list. I think because I *am* more scared by some of the realistic stuff, like a disease killing everyone or some such thing. Whereas I am less scared by fairies or supernatural stuff. Though the dark woods is one that appeals to me too! I too will take a HARD pass on the creepers in relationships though ha. And you are of course right about the age mattering- if everyone is an adult with no power dynamic at play, I am much more chill about it. Otherwise… NOPE.

okay this post is 100% relateable??? are you me?? I also really really hate haunted houses with rattling noises because whenever i’m home alone i start thinking about these things, but also: i will read the book anyways, just because it’s so good, until i get to the point that i’m so terrified that i caNT, anymore. so, you know. (10 points to me for my bravery!)

Yessss creepy children and ghosts with sad stories are my favourite – I mean they’re always so soft and lovely on the inside but will rip your face off if you wrong them! I had so much fun reading this post , I love a good creepy tale though anything with evil woods or something deadly inside my house is horrible NOPE NOPE NOPE nothing under my floor, hiding in the attic or living in the walls NO NO THANK YOU!! Gorgeous post as always Cait 🙂

FORESSSTTSSSSSS <3
I was hating #SlavicNovel for a bit (i.e. the last five months) but I just made myself reread it and I.. fell in love again with my own creepy forest? So I guess I don't totally hate it anymore?
I also really love when there is subtle unexplained creep in a world, where a person or a setting just feels… off. But there's no real reason for it it's just how they are. Like the creepy forests 🙂

ALSO YES TO AGE GAPS. I mean YES to saying THEY ARE BAD. So creepy and I immediately drop any ship with a large age gap because ew *shivers*.

Ugh, the whole ‘something is in the walls’ thing is one of the creepiest (in a bad way!) things for me. I mean, how are you meant to escape something that can follow you through the walls, without jumping out of a window or something?
I also personally find creepy children creepy in a bad way… All that staring, and saying creepy things in their creepy high voices just freaks me out!
Great post! 🙂

okay so I do like a little bit of suspense in my books…I like chase scenes where characters don’t know who is chasing them a lot (I guess that’s more scary rather than creepy. but if it’s in tunnels it’s creepy. I went to some tunnels a few weeks ago and ohhhhh myyyy gossh. speaking of tunnels and chases and being just the right amount of creepy, have you heard of the book Sabriel by Garth Nix? I read it a while ago, and quite liked it but it’s nbd) (hahah). I also love forests! I just read Uprooted which has the creeeepiest of forests and it’s utterly excellent.
like you diseases freak me out a lot. I had to read Station Eleven, which is a good book, for my english class. they don’t linger on the pandemic too much, but we watched part of Contagion (which I assume is the movie you’re talking about) in class, and UGH. I love the boardgame pandemic though! I also don’t like creepy creatures with loose skin/shapeshifting. It just gets me somehow.

OH MY I’M ANTI-GOOP TOO. I easily get disgusted. When I touch something eh, my thoughts spin so fast and I tend to overthink. It’s the worst actually.

I loove creepy woods and faeries. I also love creepy dark stories which is why I’m so obsessed with Leigh Bardugo’s Language of Thorns. THE WITCH OF DUVA IS MY FAVORITE SHORT STORY OF ALL TIME. It’s so creepy and it plays with your mind. Just my kind of nightly read.

I also avoid watching/reading horror not because I find them scary but because I find them funny. Honestly, I just laugh at horror films (those that have ghosts and monsters in them) because they just seem over-the-top all the time. Not to mention most horror films are cheesy with zero worthwhile plot.

Psychological thrillers? NOW THOSE ARE SCARY. I devour psych thrillers even though they give me unwelcome dreams. I need content that will twist my mind. Horror doesn’t give me that kind of satisfaction.

100% yes to NOT liking things that feature biological warfare/apocalyptic disease…I’m enough of a hypochondriac in my day to day life, I don’t want to watch people getting nasty illnesses while I read (especially because it’s a bit more plausible than other “creepy” tropes). I love all things witchy and ghostly in my creepy reads but I think I just draw the line when it turns into gross creepy. I just watched the new “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” on Netflix and there were some people-eating-people references and I was like NO THANK YOU because ew, not how I want to spend my tv/fantasy time!

What Should Be Wild by Julia Fine sounds right up your alley! It features an old manor house which abuts a forest people have been disappearing into for centuries. (Plus, the writing was just fantastic!!)

So I’m the biggest scaredy cat and avoid practically *all* scary things. Like, I deliberately run very far away from thrillers, mysteries, and anything else that could somehow scare me in any way.

I think the only thing on this list that I went, “Oh, yeah! I like that!” was your category about ghosts. And even that is only because I tend to read about happy, nice ghosts, like in Harry Potter or The Raven Cycle. Which now that I think about it, those ghosts don’t act super ghostly. They barely even haunt people.

OH MY GOD YES– I AGREE WITH THESE SO MUCH. No seriously, did you read my mind *peeks over shoulder*. Yep, all my friends hatehatehate books with creepy characters/elements where I’m just sitting there in the corner in all my faerie glory. They make the book way more gripping and and leave the readers hooked on. Snarled vibes, anyone?

Looking at all the stuff that you find creepy for some reason reminds me of Holly Black books? I need to read some of her backlist books actually because they sound AMAZING. OmG I hope you pick up City of Ghosts, it’s amazing and so cute! LOL AT THE AGE GAPS omg. I actually adore the dystopian creepy stuff :DD

Ooh I definitely love creepy kids, I’m just fascinated. Other creepy stuff I love is parents giving vague answers and staring into space because those kids have priceless reactions, creepy dragons that turn out to be soft™ and well same with ghosts that are like but am I creepy? I just wanna be friendssss.

Rest everything creepy I dislike because I’m a person who startles wayyy too easily and jumps and screeches so NO THANK YOU.